


Of Horses and Men

by Roterwolkenvogel



Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: F/M, I doubt horses like to watch people fool around, Just think 'Spirit', The ship is also very lightly hinted at, aka the horses tell the story, and I wish I could assure you it's cooler than it sounds, but it might be just me being a horse crazy girl at 26, but then again I never had a horse or fooled around in front of one so what do I know, the tags are wild sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-01-07
Packaged: 2019-10-06 03:56:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17338133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roterwolkenvogel/pseuds/Roterwolkenvogel
Summary: Horse has been with Sam for longer than he cares to remember. It is a good life, for Sam is a kind rider who never pushes unnecessarily and when he does, he has a reason and makes up for it in spades.Even if trouble always inevitably finds them, Horse knows that they will come out as unscathed as possible, no matter the odds.





	Of Horses and Men

**Author's Note:**

> I had way too much fun naming the horses in this story, which is prolly why this blew up so much.
> 
> Also, horses. I never got over my horse craze it seems.

Horse has been with Sam for longer than he cares to remember. It is a good life, for Sam is a kind rider who never pushes unnecessarily and when he does, he has a reason and makes up for it in spades.  
Even if trouble always inevitably finds them, Horse knows that they will come out as unscathed as possible, no matter the odds.

This is why he isn’t worried when Sam ambles out of the saloon, hands raised in the air, right into the teeming mass of bodies. His owner knows how to talk his way out of situations like these.

Instead, he focuses on the two other horses besides him, a brown gelding and a palomino mare, both with the rigid posture of animals who are unsure of their destination.

‘Where are your riders’, he asks kindly and gets two weary looks, until the mare speaks up: ‘Looking for help.’

It’s that moment that Horse knows that trouble has only begun to start.

|||

Jack does not like humans. Too squishy. Too afraid. 

The one that they have put in the corral with him reeks of fear as he tries to come at him with a bridle and he charges, enjoying how the man yelps and gets out of the way.

He barely registers the arrival of Faraday or the ensuing conversation, until the man scrambles out over the fencing and Faraday ambles in, all swagger and amusement.

Jack noses at his hands. They both know that his calmness is a façade he only wears with Faraday, the only human who had so far been honest with him. Theirs being more of a friendship than a business arrangement of “you carry me, I give you food”.

Three more horses and riders wait outside the corral and he can already tell that the brown gelding and the palomino mare are meek little things, nothing to write home about. It’s the black one, which holds his interest.

He’s of a calmness that speaks of wisdom and age and his rider feels the same.

|||

Bonney had been Matthew Cullen’s horse before she became Emma’s. She has smelled the blood on the woman’s hands when she came back from church, her face tear-streaked and she had known that Matthew would not come back.

Emma is not an unkind human but she is rigid with grief and hard with vengeance and her riding is jarring and stiff.

She wants to help but knows little how to.

Cinnamon is a steading presence next to her, her barn mate and now companion in this endeavour. Teddy on his back looks sick with something and she can feel that Cinnamon is as worried as her.

Those two new horses she isn’t sure of – Horse seems nice enough and has spoken calming words to them as the humans had argued but Jack makes her nervous. He is too brash, too harsh and she shies away from him when his rider makes him go next to her, speaking to Emma.

‘You stay away from her’, she snorts when he angles his head as if he wants to nip Emma and his glance is curious. ‘Why do you care for the human you carry so much?’ and she understands that he does not know how these fragile beings on them can be precious, like foals.

‘Stallions’, she whispers unkindly into the wind and Jack’s rider pushes him to catch up with Horse.

She is glad for it when they split up and gladder still when she gets to go with Horse and his rider. Emma needs his calm, more than anything.

|||

Jack can’t say that his first impression of the other horses has gotten changed during the first leg of their trip – Horse is steady and calm, Bonney is weak-spirited and way too protective of the human on her back and Cinnamon has the personality of a ball of hay, albeit less tasty. He checked the latter very thoroughly on their ride, making Cinnamon screech and buckle and nearly throw off the boy on his back. It had been a worthy entertainment.

As their humans make their way over to the assembled crowd at the city they reached, Jack is looking around curiously, taking in the other horses around him. 

He had heard that Sam had ordered Faraday to pick up another companion here and he bets with himself if he can find his horse faster than Faraday can convince the man. None of them truly stand out to him and he resolves to get his entertainment elsewhere. Namely poor Cinnamon who is already straining his rope as long as possible to get out of biting range.

Unfortunately for him, Faraday has left Jack’s rope longer.

|||

Bonney could have gladly seen the last of Jack but she supposes she has to make due – at least he carries someone who agreed to fight for Emma so she should not be unkind.

She resolves to be a bit more amicable to Jack, when he and Cinnamon come back, at least for the time it takes them to get to Rose Creek. Afterwards, it hopefully will be him stabled as far away from her as possible.

Softly, she nudges Emma with her muzzle as the woman leans on her like she’s the last standing vestige in an approaching storm. There are some marks on her that Bonney is sure can be traced back to her rude capture by that grinning man they had found in the abandoned hut and she neighs in warning as he tries to come closer.

His horse, a mare as well, gives her an apologetic look: ‘He doesn’t mean it like this. He’s scared. Have you never been scared?’

‘All the time lately’, Bonney replies and buries her nose in Emma’s hair.

|||

Faraday is drunk. Not an unusual circumstance but the last time he was that drunk had been a while ago so Jack is slow to adjust his behaviour just so that the man doesn’t fall flat on his ass when he slides off him.

The horses of their new additions are quick to be amused by the display of incompetence and he can’t help but agree with them. Sometimes, his human is just as annoying as all the others.

He quite likes the two they have picked up in the last city, they aren’t meek farm horses thrown out into the world but seasoned veterans like himself. The smaller man’s mount is brown with an undertone of red, whereas the other is a darker brown, like a chestnut. He whickers at them und makes to follow Faraday, in case the man needs something to lean on.

That’s when he sees the one the other two have picked up. She’s standing between Horse and Bonney like a queen between her servants and her coat is white like freshly fallen snow. 

He abandons Faraday in his drunk stumble and trots over to the other three. If his steps have more of a swagger in them than usual, no one dares to call him out, even if Horse shakes his mane and Bonney gets closer to the other mare.

Only stopping when they stand muzzle to muzzle he is just about to introduce himself, when she looks at him and softly snorts: ‘Your human is annoying mine’

Go figure that Faraday would choose this very moment to cockblock him.

|||

They wind their way upwards through forest trees and over grass and Maria can feel her rider relax, the farther they get from the sorry little hut he had claimed for the past days.

She had known that he would appreciate the company, that was why she hadn’t alerted him to the approaching riders until they were already in the shack. Then it had been a quick nudge from where he had checked the traps he had laid in the forest and he had been on his way. 

Her reasoning to Bonney had not only been courtesy, she had been sorry for the other’s rider that she had been the one to fall to Vasquez’ lasso but she seems no worse for wear. And fear does take a toll on everyone.

As does loneliness. She had feared for her rider who is a very tactile person at the best of times and who had steadily become more jittery and nervous as their enforced loneliness had progressed.

Now he is trading barbs with the others and she can feel him relaxing minutely.

The shack they arrive to is less a surprise than the horse next to it, a dark brown gelding with a greying muzzle, who eyes them with calm indifference, as the humans dismount and engage with two others of their kind.

The hatchet whizzing past them makes Bonney shy away and Cinnamon rear and even the others are surprised. There’s a man ambling after it with a righteous fury and the horse neighs a lazy greeting before he buries his head into the lush grass again.

The following exchange is brief and ends when the man pulls free his hatchet and goes back to the trees, the brown horse following him with measured steps, but not before giving them all an assuring nod and a soft assurance of ‘we’ll be not far behind’.

(‘Assurance?’, scoffs Jack: ‘That sure sounded like a threat to me.’)

|||

Swift Wind can feel his rider tensing up as he spies the group of riders slowly making their way through the valley. There are seven of them and the unease they project is enough to make his flanks itch.

Softly, Red Harvest steers him from the plateau and his cloth-covered hooves barely make a sound as they descend into the valley. 

The night descends softly onto them and both of them make camp where they can see the smoke of the white men’s fire being carried away on a breeze. Neither of them sleeps, until he carefully bowls his rider over, nudges him onto the blanket he had spread out. Red grins at him and he knows the boy will at least pretend to catch some sleep.

At dawn, they hunt down a deer that Red slings over his back as they ride towards the encampment.

Something must have alerted them because they are greeted by cocked guns and Red slides off, dragging the deer with him. The man that approaches is tall, taller even than Red and the cadence of his words does not betray any ill intentions, when he asks them to join their cause.

He is not surprised when Red agrees. The banishment from their tribe has lain hard on his shoulders these past weeks and it feels like a worthy cause to join. And maybe, just maybe, that is their path.

|||

As they race over the open land, Brown surveys the others riding in front of him. Jack had steered him to bring up the rear and he appreciates having them all in his sight.

He might be old and grizzled like his human, but it hasn’t put a damper on his skills. 

The majority of them are well versed in the kind of trouble they ride into, but Bonney and Cinnamon are as unsure as can be, their riders even more so. He sees when they make camp and both stand close to their riders, softly whickering and casting weary glances at their surroundings.

Horse is always relaxed, like nothing can surprise him anymore, which might actually be true. He and his rider make good leaders, Brown has to give them that.

Bon-Hwa and Aristide always stand together, just like their humans are attached to the hips. And just as they do, they prefer to stay away from the others when they camp, lazily grooming each other as the darkness settles.

And then there are Jack and Maria. The more Faraday riles up Vasquez, the more Maria tends to get between them, herding her human towards Goodnight and Billy or Sam as Jack and Faraday follow like unruly foals. He’d have put an end to it if he felt that Maria would appreciate the assistance, but chances are that he’d get rebuffed too

He can’t get a read on Swift Wind though. It might be because the other horse rarely comes close to him, maybe smelling the blood of his kind staining his coat just like the blood of his rider’s people stains the skin on Jack.

|||

Rose Creek is on the smaller end of towns they’ve sought trouble in, a straight road leads in and out of the town, dotted on both sides with buildings.

Horse is the only horse going in for now, Sam on his back and Billy on his heels. The atmosphere is tense and cloying and he sees townsfolk scurry into their homes like mice when they ride in.

The evil humans they have come to seek stop them halfway through and Horse dislikes how easily Sam dismounts and puts himself in harm’s way. He considers staying when Sam shoos him away but he makes his way through a narrow alley and falls into a steady trot as gunshots start to echo off the walls.

He finds the other horses as well as Teddy and Emma in the pen the farthest away from the town, all heads over the fence, looking at him curiously.

‘How’s it going?’, Jack sounds way too excited at the prospect of mayhem and carnage and Brown just looks sad - Horse isn’t sure if it’s at Jack’s antics or the general unpleasantness.

It’s night-time before any of their humans come to fetch them, Bonney and Cinnamon having long since left with Emma and Teddy, shortly after the sounds of gunfire had subsided long enough to signal the end of the fight.

They get stabled together at the boarding house, right next to the pen of the horses that seem to have belonged to the now dead evil people. Jack makes a sport of snapping his teeth at them over the separating fence until Maria threatens to kick him where it hurts.  
He still does not stop, but whineys most pitiful when he gets what he deserves and Maria does kick him – he makes off to one end of their pen, limping most dramatically and shoots them all angry stares when he gets little in the way of actual pity.

Swift Wind even gives Maria little nudge in appreciation.

|||

Most of them are asleep when Maria spies Vasquez and Faraday stumbling out of the saloon. Neither of them seems sure on their feet and she eyes them warily, as they make it towards the pen with much more steps than necessary, forgoing a straight line in favour of swaying drunkenly from one side to the other.

She can see that Faraday has hands all over Vasquez, who seems delighted at this, if his drunken exclamations are anything to go by.

They make it to the fence, clinging to the wood and grin at each other like naughty children, before she can hear Faraday say “to hell with it” and drag Vasquez down to smash their mouths together.

‘Jesus wept’, she spooks when she hears Jack’s voice right next to her, the stallion seemingly having abandoned his sulking to come closer, surveying their humans’ exchange of salvia: ‘he gets careless when he drinks’. He makes a move as if to snap at them to get apart but she throws her head in his way: ‘Leave them be. It’s dark, no one is looking and they have little in the way of comfort anywhere else.’

Briefly she is sure that Jack will push her out of the way just to be contrary, but then he retracts. ‘Maybe you’re right’, he answers and gets back into his corner and she is halfway tempted to follow him as she watches him go.

When she turns back to their humans, they are gone.

|||

He’s the closest to the stream so he sees them first – seven big horses splashing through the narrow riverbed onto their side and the human next to him stops dead where he was making his way over to one of the fallen men.

He doesn’t see higher than the legs on the white horse when they go past him and the noose but the anticipation he feels from the humans around him makes him prance like a young foal again.

He might be an old mule and has little use than carrying bags on his back but even he can see that these seven bring with them a change of pace.

|||

There’s not much they can help with the ensuing preparations for the big fight – opposable thumbs are needed more than the raw power hiding under their skin. 

So Swift Wind is glad when Sam tells him and Red Harvest to go out scouting, eagerly relishing in stretching his legs as long and as far as they go.

He spares a quick thought to the others, most likely still penned up and then the wind in his mane is blowing everything away and he just runs and runs and runs.

|||

Preparations leave little time for their humans to come and entertain them, so they have taken to entertaining themselves. Mostly it is Jack doing the entertaining and Bon-Hwa feels like he deals with a young filly in his first summer, all jumps and races and annoyances.

Just that Jack doesn’t deserve the same lenience as a foal, so when he runs into Aristide during one of his loops around the pen, he lashes out, hard. Not that it seems to deter the stallion, he just jumps aside with a playful snap and continues onwards.

Next to him, Aristide snorts: ‘He’s like his human, isn’t he?’

‘He sure is’, he acquiesces and they watch as Jack runs over to Maria next, trying to get her to join in his foolish play.

|||

None of them are close when Swift Wind and Red Harvest come back to announce Bogue’s imminent approach, but the dappled horse comes over soon enough, to tell them.

‘At dawn’, he says and Aristide can’t help the shudder that rolls over his flanks. Goodnight hasn’t been by in three days, despite Billy checking in on them and that never bodes well.

So when nightfall comes, he sticks close to the gate of the pen, Bon-Hwa at his side.

‘You fear he will come’, says the other horse, more a statement than a question.

‘I’ve known him since before we met. It’s an old pattern, one I know by heart’ but he wishes it won’t hold true.

It does, though.

When Goodnight comes to them in the dark of the night, it’s just him and he pats Bon-Hwa in apology.

“Billy’s a braver man than I”, he admits as he throws the saddle over Aristide and leads him out.

‘Take care of Billy for us’, he asks Bon-Hwa as Goodnight says: “I trust you to keep Billy save”.

Then they speed off into the night and Aristide can hear the other horses coming awake behind them, before every noise is swallowed by the darkness.

|||

At dawn, their riders come. Horse knows that they won’t take part in the imminent attack, being safely kept as far away from it as possible.

Apart from him. Sam had whispered in his ear about forgiveness but he has seen the fires Bogue has laid and if he can carry his rider into this last fight, he will do it gladly.

The others are not as forgiving, Jack in particular being ornery and trying to follow Faraday over the fence, throwing his not inconsiderable bulk against it, again and again.

Faraday seems inclined to throw caution into the wind until Vasquez grabs his arm and drags him away. Maria throws herself between Jack and the fence which stops the stallion square in his attack.

Horse feels safe enough to leave Maria to handle the stallion and follows Sam’s lead as he directs him down Rose Creek’s main road, until they can make out the outlines of Bogue’s army on the hills at the horizon.

In the brief moment before the seething mass makes to storm the town, Horse feels Sam tense and then- then hell breaks loose.

He races through the town as bullets whizz past him, Sam hanging half off his side and shooting at everything that moves in his periphery. 

The stench of blood is overwhelming in his nostrils as he breaks through the door, feels splinters lodge in his chest and tramples down onto a human that has his weapon drawn and ready, before he safely guides Sam over the open deck to the door, speeding off as soon as he knows he is safely inside.

He rounds a corner, when he hears someone scream and from the outside a horse and rider come forth, jumping high over the burning wagons and he can’t help the brief burst of joy, rearing high, as Aristide and Goodnight come thundering in.

It’s a brief joy, when Aristide comes to a halt and snorts a warning ‘they got the metal beast’ at him before Goodnight takes off again, through the town, yelling “Gatling gun!” like a warning bell.

Horse finds Aristide in front of the church, where Goodnight has dismounted him, and nudges the other horse away. They need to get out of the town when they still can, their humans already ensconced in the fight enough that they won’t have use for them anymore.

Barely have they crossed the ends of the town when the avalanche of bullet starts flying in. A lot get caught by the buildings, the humans and the horses trapped in the town perimeters but some find them, as they gallop towards the pen where the others are.

The others are clustered together, ears laid back and teeth bared and he sees that Jack has put himself in front of Maria, who looks less than pleased about the special treatment. There is no time to make it over the fence and none of them have any dexterity when it comes to locks, so he and Aristide just press themselves onto the fence closest to the others.

After a seeming eternity, the noise lets up and the silence comes like a shock.

‘Metal beast’, Aristide says, now that his voice can be heard again and Bon-Hwa hangs his head over the fence and nudges him.

|||

He hears them yell “Andale, guero!” and “Ride, Faraday, ride!” and he knows, in his very bones, that his rider is on his way to doing something impossibly stupid.

They see the small figure racing over the grass towards the screeching metal beast on the hill and the lone shots ring all the louder for how much the beast is silent.

Faraday falls. And Jack seethes.

No one stops him when he runs against the fence, again and again, until, for a brief moment, there is a sound so loud and so shrill that it stops everything dead in his tracks.

And then Jack realises that he can’t see Faraday and the beast anymore. Where both were, is only smoke.

He screams. The fence breaks. And he is off, through the town and nearly runs over Vasquez who seems just as panicked as he is.

There’s no time to think as he allows the man to mount, before tearing off at breakneck speed until he reaches the grass around the town.

The smoke is hard to miss and he comes to a stop as Vasquez nearly falls off him in his attempt to find Faraday.

The minutes it takes to locate him feel like years. But then Vasquez swears and picks up something that looks like a straw puppet. 

For the first time in his life, Jack stands still as a human makes to get on his back and the blood of his human stains his fur.

Vasquez leaves him standing in the middle of the street when they are back in Rose Creek as he carries Faraday into the saloon. He stands where he was left, unable to tear his face away from the swinging doors, until he feels a hand on his shoulder.

Next to him, the small human that has brought this all on them stands. He can’t bring himself to hate her, so he lowers his head until she can scratch him between the ears.

“Come”, she says and leads him away and he follows.

|||

Jack comes back looking dazed and letting himself be led by Emma, timid like a new-born. And Maria knows that something is wrong.

Over the broken fence she steps on the grass and carefully makes her way to Jack, lets him press against her. This close she can feel the small tremors running over his flank like ripples on a lake.

Slowly the others follow suit and in the end, they all stand as close as possible, Jack in the middle and just wait.

|||

It’s dusk by the time anyone bothers to come and check in on them. Not that anyone blames the humans of being preoccupied with other things.

Swift Wind can see Red making his way out of town, over where they still stand clustered around Jack. He looks unaffected by the past events, apart from a smatter of blood on his face.  
Swift Wind has seen his rider looking worse so he just nudges his shoulder playfully and gets a pat for his efforts.

“We won”, Red whispers in his ears and Swift Wind neighs in victory.

Then, holding true to his rider’s knowledge of their breed, Red addresses Jack: “Faraday is alive. He’ll be-“, that’s as far as he gets when Jack tears away from their cluster, nearly rushing over Bon-Hwa in his hurry to speed off towards the town, Maria not far behind.

‘Crazy”, Aristide sighs but takes off in the same direction, Bon-Hwa hot on his heels.

Only Brown stops after his first few steps, looking back towards Swift Wind and Red. ‘Coming?’, as asks and Swift Wind follows, Red laughing softly as they amble over the grass towards the smoking remains of the town.

Maybe, this was their path.


End file.
